


your eyes, they turn to me

by rottedflowerpits



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Reminiscing, end of season 7, god idk shiro's a good boy who's always there for keith ?, i'm so bad with these
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-18
Updated: 2018-10-18
Packaged: 2019-08-03 20:21:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16332812
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rottedflowerpits/pseuds/rottedflowerpits
Summary: Forever was such an easier concept back then.





	your eyes, they turn to me

It was that day that changed things. 

Keith's eyes caught the setting sun, reflecting light shards of amethyst tangled in volcanic rock. He was smiling that rare, soft and genuine smile. His profile was haloed by the fading sunshine, and he was oblivious to Shiro's lingering gaze. He was talking quietly, eyes on the towering, compressed steel goliath that was Shiro's ticket to space—his escape from the atmosphere and earth alike.

“Honestly, I'm really jealous,” Keith laughed, the wind whipping his already wild hair around his face. The red of the sun caught his cheeks and naturally contoured his features, exaggerating high cheekbones and a perfect nose into something so newly beautiful Shiro almost gasped. 

All of this, everything between them, it wasn't appropriate. Deep in his heart, he knew that; Keith knew it too, but he elected to ignore it and bury it forever. He had his walls, his defenses. Things weren't nearly as rough for him two years ago at awkward sixteen than they were now. Keith pretended to be the composed eighteen-year-old adult everyone wanted him to be, and he killed it. 

There was a spark of envy and wonder in his eyes though, a proud smile cutting his features. Shiro's heart warmed and pushed against his breastbone as he thought about how it was reserved for only him. Despite that childish arrogance, innocence, that stubborn streak Shiro almost hated, Keith had grown and caught the light like a crystal, casting his illumination over everyone. He'd come so far in an envious amount of time, toppling Shiro from his throne of record times and test scores. He'd come in with a vicious right hook that had completely pummeled Shiro stupid, yet deep down in a gut that had every right to roil in frustrated anger, Shiro didn't care. Keith had waited forever for his redemption, a lifetime, and he still did in the eyes of some of the others, but right now...

Forever was such an easier concept back then.

Forever was a year on Pluto's moon. Forever was a week spent on vacation with Adam. Forever was Keith's punishment when he'd gone too far and had been suspended for another week. Forever was stuffed between spaces of mundane and the sparks of life, a swelling void that pushed at the both of them and increased the pressure in their ears. It whispered of everything and nothing, possibilities neither dared even dream of. 

And then forever shattered and Shiro felt himself break with it. It was that day, that he remained so unaware of the path ahead. Sometimes he wondered what life would have been like if space and his obstinate decisions hadn't become his _maîtresse-en-titre_. He wondered if he would have succumbed to the diagnosis that comprised his personality, his being, and find himself content with the outcome in the end. He wondered if he would have died peacefully and if that would have been the humane thing to do, for not only himself, but for Keith, too. 

But Keith's fire and devotion were unimaginable. Comparable to only odysseys and ballads, stories of old that spanned history with their undying love to the muses that had sparked their inspiration. Keith brought the legends to life, and encompassed the power of gods. He'd only been fifteen when Shiro had picked him up from the delinquent center, but there was that _something_ behind his eyes that had exploded like the Big Bang and turned him into the man he was today. Shiro could say a hundred times and a thousand times more how Keith turned time and folded the fabric of reality in on itself for Shiro, for nothing in return. But every time he tried, it made him feel sick. 

It was a sticky, sweet kind of thing. Like he could puke up roses and diamonds and wish with every fiber of his being that it could be enough in return. Shiro had gone from protostar to supernova, collapsing in on himself and caving to the pressure. He wanted to say he'd willingly handed everything over to Keith, but that was only hubris speaking. Shiro could have lived a thousand lives and still never come close to even a modicum of everything Keith did, for him, himself, and the others. 

Shiro's redemption felt like a joke, compared to what Keith went through. His eyes softened as he silently watched Keith sleep, finally resting peacefully after the _ordeal._

The sound the Black Lion made once it broke the atmosphere lingered in Shiro's head like a bomb's echo. He remembered watching, frozen, from the Garrison's rooftop as it erupted into flames in its trajectory towards the earth. Shiro remembered wanting to do something, _needing_ to do something to save Keith, but the pain of his fragile humanity kept him rooted where he was and watching what could have very well been the end of him. 

Luckily, that wasn't the case. Shiro forgot Keith's inner framework was forged from the hearts of newborn stars, stronger than anything else in their universe. But the sight of Keith, so small and so delicate and so suddenly _weak_ made Shiro's hands tremble as he curled them against his thighs. The most Shiro could do once they'd finally found a way into the lion was pry Keith from his seat, and cradle his lolling head before any more damage came to it. 

He was caked in blood, drying yet still oozing fresh from various splits in Keith's skin. The worst was from a gash at the top of his skull, the trail of red tracing every line on Keith's face before dripping down his chin. His breath had been so shallow and soft, and Shiro remembered the numbness that spread from his limbs to his chest when he really thought Keith was dead. 

Just before Shiro succumbed to irrationality, those eyes, those beautiful eyes, they opened. Keith had blinked once, struggling to see what was in front of him, what was happening. Shiro held his breath the entire time, unmoving, helpless and unable to do much more than whisper Keith's name in a quiet prayer. 

It felt like an eternity before that soft little genuine smile cracked Keith's features. It was an exhausted one just as much as it was one full of adoration and _love,_ and his next words were lost to the silence around them before the light faded from Keith's eyes again. 

Shiro had learned how to read Keith like a book, though, and even if his voice couldn't carry the meaning behind what he wanted to say, Shiro knew it well enough from the past that he couldn't ever forget the motion of Keith's lips when he said it: _you came for me._

_“You came for me.”_

Those very words, Shiro himself had spoken endlessly. When Shiro had been left alone at the end of the night when he was supposed to meet Adam for dinner, but work understandably got in the way and he was sitting after hours in the cafeteria with one young cadet breaking the rules. When Shiro was left alone at the launch pad, awaiting his trip to Kerberos. 

When Shiro had plummeted back to Earth, sent so far from Kerberos but yet finding himself back home, in the arms of the one he never should have left behind. Shiro hadn't realized it before he left, and he hadn't let himself even try. After all, it was inappropriate back in their day, captain and cadet, Shiro and Keith, 17 and 24. Engaged and a brother. 

Yet fate twisted their arms and broke their fingers as they both clawed at something else, for something new. Keith had decided long ago that they both deserved better, Shiro doubly more so than Keith's own self. It never really had sunk in, even back when they'd become Paladins. After all, they had been more free in those years than they ever had been back on Earth. The garrison was a shining and beautiful promise, but Voltron was platinum and the universe was Keith's oyster, where he belonged, wild and unrestrained among the stars. 

Shiro didn't even want to think about the time he missed out on when he'd died. 

He was there, but time had passed between the moments of Keith's despair whenever he had to pilot Black. The times when Keith would sit alone with Black and talk to him like he was Shiro were even more rare occurrences, happening only once in a blue moon. And every time Keith did, it was nothing but heartbreak that Shiro found himself turning away from in the end, unable to listen to the trembling in Keith's voice. He was ashamed of that last part, honestly. He should have been there. But much like the counterpart, the lie that had taken the space in Keith's life, he'd been absent. 

The small reassurance that Kuron had cared rested inside of Shiro like a pressed flower, something so delicate that had withered just like he had and died a second time, in front of Keith's eyes. If he wanted to get technical on paper, that was the third time, really. How Keith had managed to go against those odds and wrench Shiro back from the literal abyss that was a star-sealed fate for his old hero, he didn't know, but...

They both sat there alive, somehow. 

Mostly, anyway. 

Shiro's expression fell as he finally focused on the reality of the situation: Keith cradled in the depths of cushions and thick blankets, the occasional tube interlacing all of the comfortable to make it just that little bit more uncomfortable than it needed to be. But the IV infusions were a necessity, the oxygen even more so when Keith was suffering from a concussion as serious as the one he'd gotten. Bruises spiraled across his skin like dead flowers on snow, wrapping around his neck in a pattern that reminded Shiro of the silhouette of a noose. He tried not to let that get to him, reaching out instead to brush the back of his hand against Keith's cheek for the hundredth time that night. 

He really looked so young. The dim lighting of the room, the lamp with its warm yellow light casting subdued shadows over Keith's face, really brought out the boyish features that still managed to linger there. Shiro was reminded of Keith from that day at the launch, but there was no glimmer to his eyes, no spark of conscious light. 

All that was before Shiro in the moment was a husk. Shiro's hand faltered and found home around Keith's fingers again, clutching them close to his chest as he watched Keith breathe. So many years had passed between them and beside them, so many years Shiro felt like he'd taken from Keith, egging him on to false promises that had never come true, preparing Keith for the worst: a life that he'd eventually have to live on his own. He'd tried to bank promises on the fact that Keith would become the kind of person who wouldn't need someone like Shiro anymore, and that he'd find someone even better than Shiro down the road, but they were hollow and empty and he knew he'd just been feeding the kid poison since day one. A second chance had never read so much like an epitaph before then. 

But second chances were funny. Hilarious, even, in how Shiro had gotten the same sweet kiss Keith must have felt. The tables were turned and Shiro fell into the longing, the hurt that Keith must have bottled inside of himself all those years. Watching with fresh eyes as someone he loved seemed to refuse to utter those simple words he just so desperately wanted to hear. 

_You're my brother._

_I love you._

Adam had said something similar, tipsy and in the heat of a moment shared on a private deck. _“You're like a brother to me,”_ he'd laughed, blushing and awkward and like he was dancing around something else he had wanted to say. A few more drinks and Adam had found the courage to turn brother into something so much more. 

Shiro felt the conflict at just remembering the name. Keith had been a source of tension, but in a different way, in those beginning years. Once the great fallout of Shiro and Adam's mountainous legacy started, though, Keith had become even more of a bitter issue. Where Adam said no Keith said yes. Where Adam erred on the side of caution Keith ran ahead, turning his bitter resentments into heated speeches late at night over how Shiro shouldn't have to conform to what others around him wanted. To hear someone so young spew words beyond his years always gave Shiro whiplash, a guilt settling in his stomach as his mind always wandered to how Keith's formative years must have been like. 

Either way, they fueled the guy to do such great things. 

The heavy tears at the corners of Shiro's eyes fell before he even noticed they were there. His throat tightened on impact and he blinked rapidly, bending over to rest his forehead against Keith's knuckles. They were so cold, his fingers unresponsive. Despite the promises from the doctors that he would be okay, there was a lingering paranoia from his own diseased path that battered at the door of his mindset with the ideas of something going wrong. Horribly wrong. 

And to finally have each other, after everything...it'd be that ironic stroke of sadistic luck from the universe that would tear them apart. Warriors in a battle that was inconceivable and impossible to comprehend, overcoming trial after trial of what shouldn't have even happened or existed, only to be torn apart by something like _this._ Degenerative diseases. Cancer. Brain damage beyond repair. 

Shiro sucked in a hard breath and shook his head, swallowing around the knot in his throat. Faith was the underlying fuel that thundered in Keith's veins. Faith and devotion, a new order to his world that he wanted to share with Shiro. The least he could do in return was at least try and pretend he had that same god-killing force that Keith had. 

Shiro distracted himself momentarily by looking outside. The evening was raw and cool, dark grey clouds illuminated by the blaze of the moon swathing the sky in lace. The moonbeams filtered in onto the foot of Keith's bed, and Shiro finally turned the lamp off to leave themselves in the unforgiving silence of the satellite. They'd both found so much comfort in it, and her stars, and the planets beyond. It was almost like old times, settled on Shiro's bed and sharing that first clandestine kiss that had banished Shiro to hell. 

But all those little moments, what he thought would be regrets...he really didn't regret at all. Even if actions had spoken louder than any word between them, they were treasured moments he couldn't bring himself to let go of. Not now, when they were so close to finally just _having_ each other. 

Shiro glanced up, squeezing Keith's hand. Exhaustion threatened to tear him away from the mortal world for just a bit, but something in Shiro's gut kept him up just that little bit longer. He sat there, still, watching over Keith like a loyal sentry. It wasn't long before even Atlas had to rest, though, and Shiro was vaguely aware of the fact he'd settled on Keith's chest like it was a pillow. One that gently beat out the rhythm of Keith's life force, a steady sound that told Shiro it wouldn't be giving up so soon. 

Just before that darkness completely took over, Shiro felt a feather-light touch in his hair, and heard a broken voice that still spoke with such a volume it made his soul soar: 

“Shiro...you came for me...”

**Author's Note:**

> sometimes when i'm alone at work and have too much time to think, this happens. this was also fueled by a lot of unfortunate hormones. 
> 
>  
> 
> [lovely song, freaky video.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNRCvG9YtYI)
> 
> as always, though, you can find me over at my [tumblr!](https://rottedflowerpits.tumblr.com/)


End file.
